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State and local governments are increasingly using property law to push back on ICE operations. This report unpacks the viability of these efforts, from banning new detention centers to barring officers from staging operations on city property.

"On Thursday, Minnesota state prosecutors announced a historic set of charges against a federal immigration agent. Gregory Donnell Morgan Jr. has been charged with two felony counts of second-degree assault for pointing his gun at two Minnesota residents as they sat in their car back in February, right in the midst of the Trump administration’s brutal immigration crackdown in Minneapolis, dubbed Operation Metro Surge. Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty said she believes that this might be the first charge of its kind nationwide."

"Proposals to prohibit federal immigration agents from masking their faces have gained new life in states — thanks in part to a court ruling that blocked the nation’s first such law, in California."

"A California law aimed at prohibiting ICE agents from wearing masks was struck down in court earlier this year. The carve-out that led to the successful Trump administration challenge came out of negotiations between the offices of Gov. Gavin Newsom and Sen. Scott Wiener. Newsom and Wiener have said they were proud to pass the first attempt at an ICE mask ban, and efforts to pass a new version are underway."

"The Hennepin County Attorney’s Office is investigating 17 incidents in which immigration authorities potentially violated the law — including one involving former Border Patrol Commander Gregory Bovino — and is asking the public to submit evidence that could assist the investigations. "

From Portland to Minneapolis, aggressive actions by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents against citizens and noncitizens alike have been well documented. Many of these encounters raise grave constitutional concerns. Yet it may surprise—and alarm—many to learn that there is often no viable path to sue federal officers if they violate your constitutional rights, even egregiously.

“A U.S. citizen and Army veteran who was detained by federal immigration authorities for three days last summer in Southern California filed a civil rights suit against the federal government on Wednesday."

"If you're skeptical of states going after ICE agents in particular, ... there's a really strong originalist case that states have this power."

"Congress has never created an analogous version for federal agents, largely because it sort of didn't have to. The result is that you have federal agents who are behaving as if they know it is extremely unlikely that they will face any penalty for violating constitutional rights."

Horizontal, interbranch competition is only one species of checks and balances. Especially in moments of politically consolidated federal power, the Constitution’s structure offers another, potentially more meaningful safeguard: the states.